Pneumatised!

I recently decided to make my reiki manuals one and two available for purchase through lulu.com. If you’re interested in reiki, already a practitioner, or a reiki teacher, you should find my reiki manuals interesting to read. It is a blend of Western reiki and Japanese reiki based on the training I received in Western reiki and my research into Japanese reiki. Only manuals one and two are available right now. I am still working on the third manual. I put it aside about a year and a half ago as I was mulling over some things in my head. In any case, I hope to get that done by the end of this year and will be putting that on lulu.com. I also have a “regular book” that I am planning to write on reiki that I hope will catch a wider readership. To see everything I have published on lulu.com, go to my storefront – http://stores.lulu.com/brighidsflame.

Because I could not decide on the covers I wanted for the manuals I opted for two different covers for each manual. There are also two different binding versions for each manual. You may purchase a spiral bound version or a perfect bound version. The spiral bound version is ideal for note-taking and studying. The perfect bound version is great as a reference copy. Both versions are 8.5″x11″.

Here are the two different covers for reiki manual one:

and for reiki manual two:

To quickly purchase one of my manuals, use the buttons below. They will put the manual directly into your lulu.com shopping cart.

Click this button if you want to purchase reiki manual one (cover 1, spiral bound version)

Click this button if you want to purchase reiki manual one (cover 2, spiral bound version)

Click this button if you want to purchase reiki manual one (cover 1, perfect bound version)

Click this button if you want to purchase reiki manual one (cover 2, perfect bound version)

Click this button if you want to purchase reiki manual two (cover 1, spiral bound version)

Click this button if you want to purchase reiki manual two (cover 2, spiral bound version)

Click this button if you want to purchase reiki manual two (cover 1, perfect bound version)

Click this button if you want to purchase reiki manual two (cover 2, perfect bound version)

A little note regarding my decision to self-publish my manuals:

Why is self-publishing better than the traditional mass-market publishing? The reason I chose to self-publish is that the majority of the revenue goes to the me as the author. If you appreciate the value of what I personally put into writing my books, you will like the fact that what you are paying goes to me rather than the “middleman”, that is, the retailers. Through lulu.com 80% of the net income (sale price minus manufacturing costs) goes to me, 20% goes to the lulu.com. Contrast that with mass-market publishing, where the retailer marks up the price by at least double their costs. This is the formula for selling retail:

Manufacturing costs plus author’s revenue (that would be the royalties I’d want) plus retail markup (this is double manufacturing costs plus author’s revenue) = sales price

Contrary to what some people may believe, books published on the mass-market aren’t necessarily better books than self-published books. (The gods only know how many books I put back on the shelf after flipping through them.) By supporting independent publishers like myself, you are encouraging people who honestly love to write. Part of the reason there are so many pointless books in the retail bookstores is that some people write simply to turn a buck or two. It’s very annoying. So please, please support independent publishers! Thanks.

~~~C

Ah… it’s been another busy couple of months.

Here’s a couple of novels I finished reading recently:
30 Days of Night – Rumours of the Undead by Steve Miles and Jeff Mariotte
A Kiss of Shadows by Laurell K. Hamilton

and a couple of comics:
30 Days of Night – Return to Barrow
Buffy – Time of Your Life (Season 8, volume 4)

Following is a list of books that I’ve started reading:
Winter’s Heart (book nine of The Wheel of Time) by Robert Jordan
Three Against the Witch World by Andre Norton
Gormenghast (the sequel to Titus Groan) by Mervyn Peake
Rogue Squadron (book one of Star Wars: X-wing) by Michael A. Stackpole
A Clash of Kings (book two of A Song of Ice and Fire) by George R.R. Martin
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (as of today, I am on part three of book two, page 443)
Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon

I mentioned that I was putting a few books aside for now. I think for now I am putting Ursula LeGuin’s Always Coming Home aside for now. I think it will be more likely that I will read either The Left Hand of Darkness or The Dispossessed before I finish Always Coming Home when I get back to reading LeGuin novels.

Here is a review of The Sum of All Men (book one of Runelords) by David Farland:

I didn’t actually finish this book because I was disappointed with the story line so far. I think I read the first 100 pages or so. I don’t really buy into the scenario of people seeing how great and glamourous Raj Ahten is to the point that they decided to throw down their weapons and surrender to him. I sort of feel cheated, like he copped out of having to write a decent battle scene between the two armies (which seems strange to me as the overall writing is decent enough).

Then, there is the supposedly “strong” heroine who verbally threatens to risk her life by taking up arms in the battlefield if it was required, but deep inside wouldn’t really. For someone who trains in martial arts and lives its philosophy, suffice it to say the heroine of the novel was a big disappointment for me. Clearly, the author thinks some women can look strong, but really must not be that strong mentally or physically in reality.

I really enjoy George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire and Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time much better than this novel. Seeing as I still have some ways to go with Martin’s series, still have to catch up with Jordan’s series, and have a few other books that might be more interesting to read than Farland’s, I doubt I will be inclined to finish reading this novel by Farland any time soon.

30 Days of Night – Rumours of the Undead was a decent story. The story isn’t going to be anyone’s favourite, and it really should be read as part of the 30 Days of Night continuity. The overall 30 Days of Night series is intriguing. I will have to see how well I like it after reading through a few more of the graphic novels.

A Kiss of Shadows (book one in the Merry Gentry series) has Hamilton’s typical flair for sarcasm, humour, and adventure that is familiar from her Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series. The difference is that the Merry Gentry series is more romantic in nature and very sensual (to put it mildly). I am more interested in this series for Hamilton’s depiction of the faery world. So far it is intriguing and she has built a full world with lots of different, not just characters, but species. Intriguing.

Yay, Buffy! What can I say? I love Buffy the Vampire Slayer – the ultimate kick-ass girl. But what happens when Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets Fray the Vampire Slayer? Oh no! Time warp! If you are a Buffy fan and haven’t been reading the season eight comics, you really should pick up Time of Your LIfe (volume four of Buffy season 8). I love the art in this series and the whole series is overseen by Joss Whedon. This is stuff you wouldn’t have seen in a TV series.

And speaking of Buffy, I finally got the last Buffy Omnibus – volume 7. “Oh happy happy joy joy!”

I recently went back to reading Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time. I’m on book nine, Winter’s Heart. I am a little more than a third of the way through, but then got into another one of those crazy writing phases where I write almost non-stop and my brain keeps jumping topics so I have to accomodate by working on more than one writing thing at a time. (Yes, my brain really does work that way sometimes. Some days I wonder that I make any sense at all!)

~~~C